Great mentors are key to successful career path. Mentors when coach their mentees excellently- further defines your organisations success as well. Having said that, these desired qualities in mentors can definielty be developed with good training and practices. Lets have a look at the desired qualities in a successful mentor and how these can be developed.
Successful mentor qualities
Actively listens
Active listening requires that the listener fully concentrates, understands, responds and then remembers what is being said. It is a well noticed trait- where people jump to conclusions in their brains and have already made up their minds on how they are going to respond to what was just said. This does not really help. A good mentor has to “really” actively listen and hold his/her urge to respond quickly. Let the whole information sync in without any interruptions. However, good mentors- just don’t sit back like a log when the other person is talking. They take notes, ask questions when the other side has finished and reflect back on what they really understood. One may provide with good non-verbal gestures like eye contact, nodding etc- only conveying their understanding and openness to listen more.
Mentors spend much of their time talking and listening to mentees and hence active listening should definitely be a quality to be focused and developed as a key habit.
Success driven for the mentee
Most successful and happy in life folks are not necessarily only focused on their success. These individuals care about the organization and the people within that organization and have a genuine desire to see everyone and everything succeed: the company, the employees, and the mentoring program as a whole. This is a much desired trait in successful mentor. A good mentor not only looks at his success but actively considers and cares about everyone's success.
Is a good role model
Good and successful mentors actively foresee their own actions and plans being suck down into their mentees. That mean’s you plan, behave and action the way you want your mentees to be. Just preaching and not really practicing your preaches is a bad sign and doesn’t go down well as framing you a good mentor.
Gives and takes feedback
Giving feedback to your mentee, both kudos and constructive criticism, is a very rewarding experience for both parties. It can help them improve in an area they have been struggling with, or highlight where they have been successful so they can duplicate their actions to be more successful in the future. At the same time, taking constructive feedbacks from your mentee, also helps improve yourselves and makes the mentee know of your efforts to make things work out for them.
Shares stories
Mentees do learn when you share your experiences and stories.One of the main reasons people become mentors is to help someone benefit from your experiences, good and bad. Sharing the knowledge you’ve learned along the way is a great way to help your mentee, but sharing your own personal experience with them is even better.